The words were like a cut, trying to sever them, but Lottie had seen it; she knew it was real whether Ellie admitted it or not. She didn’t gasp or recoil this time; instead she squeezed her fists, gritting her teeth, and she shouted, ‘You’re lying!’

Tears pooled in her eyes, the salt stinging her rain-dampened cheeks, and it wasn’t just Ellie; it was Claude and this awful secret, and Jamie, and everything they’d been through.

‘You’re lying,’ she said again, and this time her fists came down softly on Ellie’s chest, trying to force the feeling back into her. Her voice barely above a breath, she demanded it once more, willing it to life. ‘You’re lying.’

‘Lottie –’

Before Ellie could speak another word, Lottie grabbed her face, fingers hungrily feeding on the warmth of her body, and rising up on her tiptoes, she placed her lips over hers, forcing the lie and all her cruel words back down into her throat.

For a wonderful moment everything was right, their bodies melting into each other as Ellie stepped forward, the two of them pressed into the stone balcony like they might become one with the building, forging their feelings into the stone for eternity. Everything faded away with the taste of coffee and spice. There were no more secrets, no more awful truths or burdens; they were the only two people in the world, and she was safe.

Ellie made a noise halfway between a growl and a whine, and then she pushed Lottie back. As she pulled herself together, Ellie seemed to shrug off the kiss, licking it from her lips with a contemptuous look. ‘No,’ she said, and it dripped with the same unaffected bite as it had before. ‘I wasn’t lying.’

Lottie felt her body turn to ice and all the warmth ripped away from her, leaving her shivering and feverish. ‘But that kiss?’

‘It’s all just a bit of fun, isn’t it?’ Ellie pushed a hand through her hair casually, the rain slicking it back in a sticky clump, and when she looked down her bee-stung lips twitched from the kiss like a horse kicking off its rider. ‘Not my fault you took more from it than there ever was.’

Lottie pushed past Ellie, her body convulsing, warning that she might be sick, and each step felt like a hundred knives were tearing into her feet. ‘I have to … I have to go.’

She gagged as she said it, feeling like her heart might fall out of her chest if she didn’t cradle her stomach. She didn’t want Ellie to see her like this. She needed to find someone who would hold her and not ask any questions, someone who understood without her having to say a single word. Running down the stairs, her feet clumsy, she knew exactly who she was looking for.

She was looking for Jamie.

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